


Small Comforts

by viceversa



Series: One Word [17]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Relationship, Scully's Period, they're obviously in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-24
Updated: 2019-01-24
Packaged: 2019-10-15 18:29:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17533967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viceversa/pseuds/viceversa
Summary: Scully gets her period at work, her first since she found out she was infertile, and Mulder comforts her the best he can.





	Small Comforts

**Author's Note:**

> this came from a few anon prompts!   
> 1.I had an idea that the first time Scully gets her period after finding out shes infertile shes super upset and Mulder has to comfort her. Like shes in the office and Mulder wonders where she disappeared to and she's crying in the bathroom  
> 2.Will you write a fic based on Mulder giving Scully belly or back rubs and generally comforting her on her period please and thank you  
> 3\. Thank you, for everything  
> 4\. I’m not going anywhere  
> so thanks anons! follow me on tumblr at viceversawrites

 

I looked up mid-sentence, realizing that I was alone in the office. This wouldn’t be entirely unusual, had I not just been having a conversation with Scully about our latest case. Come to think of it, she hadn’t responded in the last minute or two, and I was saying some fairly insane things at that point for sheer entertainment value.

I stand, my mind automatically going to _she literally disappeared, she’s abducted again and I missed it_ before thinking maybe she just walked out. For some reason. A quick search of the office doesn’t reveal her, and I’m a curious person so I go out into the hall and look. She’s still in the building, her things are here, and it’s been too long for a vending machine or coffee run.

I check the bathroom first, just down the hall past the copiers. I’m not a complete idiot, so I don’t just burst in, but I crack the door and knock. 

“Scully? You in there?”

I hear noises, coming from a stall, and it sounds like crying. Shit, what did I do this time?

“Scully, you okay? I’m sorry for following you, but I didn’t know where you went.” I lean in a little further and spy her heels under a stall door, the crying sounds more repressed but still there. “You gotta answer or I’m going to assume you’re being mind-controlled or something and burst in there.”

A soft sob gave way to a pity laugh, something Scully always granted me for my horrible jokes, and I knew she was okay.

“I’m okay, I think. Just, Mulder. I’m sorry, could you bring me my purse please?” Her voice wavered under whatever she was dealing with.  

Her purse? Oh. Woman things. “Sure. Be right back.”

I jog back down the hall and retrieve her purse, knowing from much experience that handling a woman’s purse was a big deal, and that looking inside was a big no-no. I respected Scully too much to even think about it. 

I re-entered, handed the purse to her under the stall wall, and retreated for her privacy. “I’ll be in the office.”

“Thank you.” Her voice was small, sad, and it sounded so pitiful I almost did run back in and hold her until she felt better. Was it very painful? She hadn’t reacted like this before. I hoped she had drugs in that purse too.

I didn’t have to wait long and Scully was walking in the doorway, face puffy and still looking sad and something else. What was going on? She moved like she was numb, in shock, like she’d just received horrible news.

“Scully, no offense, but you look... are you really okay?” I walked over to where she’d dropped her purse next to the desk and she looked up at me. I knew, I felt in that second, that she was going to cry again and I reacted on instinct, opening my arms to her.

She fell against my chest easily and cried. The last time she did this, Jesus, I didn’t want to think about it. I felt my worry rising with every second.

“I’m sorry, Mulder, really. I’m okay. I just.” She tightened her hold on me and sniffed, gathering herself. “I’m a little emotional. This might be too much information, but a while ago I had found out that, as a result of my abduction, I am infertile.” Her voice was quiet, factual, clinical.

Oh, god. I tightened my hug around her.

“I haven’t, um, had a period since. And I didn’t expect to ever have one again, and then it’s happening again suddenly when we were talking earlier and I didn’t even think I just panicked.”

“I’m so sorry, Scully.” It was all I could say. I didn’t understand all of this from her perspective and I never would be able to. “Are you okay, uh, medically? With this new symptom?” I tried to remain clinical for her sake, worried beyond belief.

“Yes, I think so. My doctor said it was a possibility, but it had just been so long, and I wasn’t expecting it to happen.” She sucked in a breath at the end of the sentence and I felt her body tense against mine. 

“Are you—Scully are you in pain?”

She looked up at me kindly, tear tracks still on her face, breaking my heart every time I saw them. “That sort of goes with the territory, Mulder.”

“Do you have drugs here?”

“I—I do, but they won’t help right away. I didn’t take them in time. I—” another cramp seized her and I physically felt her legs go weak as she spoke through the pain.

“I’ll be fine. We can go back to work. Thanks for understanding.”

Jesus, all this pain and suffering monthly and now for nothing. Now, as a reminder she couldn’t—I stopped the thought. That was a dangerous path to go down. But right now, there was no way in hell I was going to let us just go back to work while she was suffering.

“No. We’re going home.” I left her standing and started to gather our jackets, shutting off the computer and lights as she protested. 

“What? It’s the middle of the day, Mulder.”

“It’s Friday.”

“We were doing paperwork, finding our next case.”

“That can wait until Monday. No arguments.”

She looked at me with what I can only describe as surprise, relief and gratitude.

“Come on, I’ll take you home.”

She shrugged on her coat and I followed her out the door, watching her normally confident stride falter and wobble. I offered my arm and she took it gratefully, holding it from the elevator and to her car. No way was I going to let her drive like this, either.

“Thank you,” she said as I released her arm at the passenger door. “My, um, it always makes my legs weak and painful when I don’t take the pills ahead of time. Just a side effect.”

I nodded at her admission, assuming as much. While I didn’t grow up with women who had these problems, Sam was so young… I had girlfriends, and more than my fair share of their complaining and discomfort. I decided to be smart and just accept what she was saying at absolute face value, and continually feel thankful that I was a guy.

Halfway to her home she cringed, her hand on her stomach, tense all over. She saw the look on my face and shook her head, mumbling that she was okay. Fuck that, I thought. She obviously wasn’t. She shivered and I turned up the heat, cold myself.

“The cold always made it all worse, too.” She offered, probably as just something to say.

I hoped she wasn’t feeling embarrassed, or ashamed. I hoped I wasn’t making her feel like she had to explain or justify how she felt. I hope she just trusted me with her life in small, important ways like this. 

“That sounds like the literal worst, and I’m happy to be a guy. Really, really grateful.” I overplayed by response, hoping to catch another elusive laugh and I was rewarded with one better, a laugh and a short smack to my arm. As we neared her apartment I turned a little serious again.

“Since it’s, uh, been a while, will this one be really bad?”

“Probably,” she said, matter-of-fact, resigned.

I parked her car and offered my arm to her again, which she readily accepted. We got inside, and she immediately walked to her bedroom, tossing over her shoulder

“I’m going to change, give me a minute.”

I let her go, hanging my own coat up and wondering what my role currently was. Friend? What do male friends do in this situation? Whatever she wanted me to do, I suppose. The guilt, from her abduction, her pain, started to creep in. I tried not to let it cloud over right now, not wanting to retreat from her. 

I made myself useful instead, collecting her mail from the floor, filling a glass of water for her, and one for me. I sat on her couch, and she appeared quickly dressed in warm-looking socks, sweatpants, and a shirt and jacket. A rare, weekend Scully outfit I’d seen on her a few times before.

“Want to watch a movie or something? Or, you don’t have to stay, Mulder.” Scully sat next to me, pulling a blanket from the back of the couch with her. 

“I’m not going anywhere, if you want the company.” I didn’t want to leave, not while she was hurting. It made me hurt, too.

She smiled back, fiddling with the remote. “Sure.”

She settled on some movie, a western, that she seemed interested in. I watched her instead, noticing her grimaces, her readjustments, her tensing and untensing. 

“Is there anything I can do to help?” I blurted out after a particularly bad one. “Get you anything?”

“That’s really sweet of you, Mulder.” Her smile was brief but beautiful. I’d cut off my left leg if it would help her right now. “Heat, usually helps. Which is why the winter sucks so much. Other than that, I just have to wait until the pills kick in.” She adjusted her blanket and I got an idea.

“I’m warm. Here,” I moved closer, lifting the edge of the blanket so that it was partly over me as well. “Scoot in.”

“Really?”

“Of course. Least I can do. Literally.”

“You’ve already done a lot, Mulder. You’ve been great. And I really appreciate it.” The praise was quiet but clear, and my heart thumped loudly in my chest for a few beats. God, I loved her.

“Come on,” I motioned her into my side already feeling warmer with our combined body heat. She was so small, curled up into my side like this. I wrapped my arm around her and slowly, so she could stop me if she wanted, slid my hand over her stomach, resting low. 

She hummed and leaned into me further. “That feels good.”

“Glad I can be of service.”

After a few minutes of sitting in silence, close to each other, growing warmer, Scully covered my hand with hers, readjusting it slightly lower and keeping her hand on top. I quelled my desire at the movement, knowing full well none of that would be happening right now. Down boy.

“Thank you, for everything.” I knew she meant more than just my actions today, and I nodded against her head, kissing her hair for a long moment in response.

Minutes passed as we watched the cowboy bicker with the female lead, presumably well on their way to falling in love with each other without realizing it. Gently, my thumb started to swipe up and down, rubbing her gently. I knew she was probably sensitive to touch right now, so I was careful to go slowly, softly.

Scully hummed, resting more heavily against my side. This was a little slice of heaven, I thought. Or as close as we could get with Scully in pain and uncomfortable like this. Hell, I couldn’t care if she’d told me to go to the corner and stand on my head if it made her feel better, I’m just happy this was helping. She hadn’t been as tense since I started.

The movie eventually ended, and Scully had been breathing a little too deeply the last fifteen minutes or so. She was asleep, relaxed into my side, under my hand. I felt a great privilege swell up in my chest, right alongside happiness. I turned off the TV, keeping my hand steady and adding my other around hers for stability. I’ll let her sleep, as long as she wants. I wasn’t going anywhere.


End file.
